Scientific literacy – what it is, how to recognize it, and how to help people achieve it through educational efforts, remains a difficult topic. The latest attempt to inform the conversation is a recent National Academy ...

A report on the spending habits of Māori women has identified that a culturally-responsive community model could help improve financial literacy among Māori. The research project, which was conducted by the Westpac Massey ...

U.S. adults perform comparably to adults in other economically developed countries on most measures of science knowledge and support science in general, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, ...

Previous studies have shown that as humans age, cognitive declines are inevitable. Now, a recent study by researchers at the University of Missouri and Texas Tech University has confirmed that this cognitive decline extends ...

High debt, low savings and a lack of financial literacy are the unfortunate hallmarks of millennial financial health, according to a new report developed by the George Washington University Global Financial Literacy Excellence ...

It has long been said teaching is both an art and a science. In a new study that uses a scientific lens to look at the conversational art of instruction, a team of researchers identify specific ways teachers talk to students ...

Literacy

Literacy has traditionally been described as the ability to read for knowledge, write coherently and think critically about printed material.

Literacy represents the lifelong, intellectual process of gaining meaning from print. Key to all literacy is reading development, which involves a progression of skills that begins with the ability to understand spoken words and decode written words, and culminates in the deep understanding of text. Reading development involves a range of complex language underpinnings including awareness of speech sounds (phonology), spelling patterns (orthography), word meaning (semantics), grammar (syntax) and patterns of word formation (morphology), all of which provide a necessary platform for reading fluency and comprehension. Once these skills are acquired the reader can attain full language literacy, which includes the abilities to approach printed material with critical analysis, inference and synthesis; to write with accuracy and coherence; and to use information and insights from text as the basis for informed decisions and creative thought.

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) defines literacy as the "ability to identify, understand, interpret, create, communicate and compute, using printed and written materials associated with varying contexts. Literacy involves a continuum of learning in enabling individuals to achieve their goals, to develop their knowledge and potential, and to participate fully in their community and wider society."